“[push] past the ordinary… putting aside the first thing that springs to mind (it’s almost always a cliche) or giving it such a twist as to realign ‘the usual’ completely…”

My first instinct, the thing that sprung to my mind when looking at the image, was “Child for Sale!” Certainly not a cliched response or ‘ordinary’, one would hope. However, this started me on a strange journey.

My second thought was: “Aren’t they lovely, but I couldn’t eat a whole one.” Again, rather disturbing, but I do have a dark sense of humour. However, something set alarm bells ringing about such a plot idea. I did some googling on eating babies and pretty soon hit on “Blood Libel”. What a great title, I thought for a few seconds. Then I did some background reading (see References), as I realised to use such a phrase would require me to know the issues. What surprised me wasn’t the Anti-Semitic propaganda, but how it is still happening as much as Holocaust denial. Could I do this topic? Should I do this topic?

Here is my answer, in 99 words:

“Ninety Nine Lives”
by Dr. Mike Reddy (@doctormikereddy) [99 words]

“That’s her!”

“Yes, Father…”

“…selling babies. See! They ate babies, you know.”

“No they didn’t, Father. We’ve discussed this. That’s ‘Blood libel’.”

“…ground them into flour for bread. Drank their blood like wine…!”

“No, Father, they didn’t. It was lies. You were told these lies to… help you cope with what you were ordered to do. Your pillow comfortable?”

“They pleaded at the end. Denied everything, of course, but orders were orders. ‘Nein! Nein!’ they would scream. It was all about the ‘Nein’s. I still hear them…”

“A Fate Worse than Death is Better than Dying”
by Dr. Mike Reddy (@doctormikereddy) [250 words]

Whoever she was, she had been medically trained. I’d given blood many times – civic duty and all that – but her handling of the hypodermic was exquisite. In and out with a quick swipe of alcohol. No venous bruising.

My silent captor slipped the rubber tube tourniquet through the arm restraint, taped some cotton wool over the puncture wound, then inspected her watch and made some notes on an Android tablet. A geek then. No iPad. Something to use to connect to her.

“Not an Apple fan then?” I smiled as empathically as I could, tied to a gurney.

“Please don’t attempt to engage my sympathetic side, because I had it surgically removed. Now, I’m going to ask you for some observations as the injection takes effect.” She picked up her tablet expectantly.

Here is my (ineligible) submission if you don’t want to see the original piece:

[500 words, special challenge accepted]

Title: “Get it? Got it. Good!”

“His son watched as he was snatched away.”

“What? Wait… Who?”

Vague pronouns? Seriously? Not the best start to a school report.

“Ghandi.” the word came out half chewed. I glanced at the term paper in front of me. Yup the red ink surrounded the title.

Who’s gHandi?” I asked. The H forced out deliberately, like the scrape of a hastily opened curtain.

“Whatcha mean ‘Who’s Ghandi?’ You know. The Guy… the guy we had to write about!”

A general chuckle of approval from the other students seemed to bolster the young man’s resolve to dive into the water of education and yet remain completely dry. He smiled to his audience, especially those he thought were the hottest chicks. Idly I wondered if their lack of clothing was cause or effect. Either way, no one had their minds on one of the greatest political thinkers of the last century.

“By any chance, do you mean Gandhi?

“Huh?”

“G A N D H I” Each letter alliterated in chalk on the board. “There is no ‘Ghandi’.”

“There is no… Is this some Zen thing, Mr Coulter?”

“No, Mr. Carter. Although Gandhi was influenced by many religions, his practical philosophy of passive resistance was based on Hindu and Jain teachings”

“Who’s Jane, Mr Coulter? And what’s a hen d…”

“Zac. We aren’t doing the ‘What’s a hen do?’ joke again are we?”

From the back of the class “Lay eggs!” was heard from various quarters, accompanied by titters of intolerance. Clearly we were doing the ‘hen do’ joke again.

“Who can tell me what ‘passive resistance’ is?” I scanned the auditorium hopefully.

Zac high fived his nearest conspirator, as most of the males in the room hooted their approval. I expected to be warmed by Sandy’s reddened cheeks, but she simply hooked arms with her neighbours in sisterly silence. Something, I wasn’t sure what, was brewing.

“That’s ok, Mr. C…” she silenced me before I had the chance to admonish the boys, “If we have to ‘put up’ we won’t ‘put out’ will we girls…”

A chorus of ‘uh uh’s, ‘na hah’s and ‘no way’s swept across the classroom. I shouldn’t have laughed, but the boys were slower on the uptake.

“What’s she saying?” Zac gazed round the room. His compadres were suddenly more interested in the floor or the window. They got it.

“Without wanting to put words in Miss Lawson’s mouth, but I think she’s wanting an apology, or none of you will have… er… dates this weekend. Is that correct, Sandy?”

“Indeed it is, Mr. C.” Sandy flicked round expectantly to Zac. “We’re waiting… Mr. Carter…” she smirked conspiratorially at the other young women. They got it.

“Ok. Sorry.” Zac slowly deflated.

“Sandy, a perfect example of ‘passive resistance’ if I ever saw one. You get ten out of ten.”

Eireann (Ireland) was the prima facie, but before The Silence there were reports from parts of Africa and France too. Wales went so quickly that only reports from the border confirmed that territory as being part of the initial wave of quiet that washed over the World. At first the rest of the planet assumed technical problems, or cyber terrorism, to be the cause.

When the phenomenon we now call The Silence took 99.9% of 7.2 billion souls, the few of us unaffected learned quickly to mask ourselves. The alternative for those not pawky enough to – how did they used to put it? – see the writing on the wall was quite horrific. Slavery at best. Mutilation or execution in the worst cases. It never ceases to amaze me how little communication a mob needs to become a mob.

We few (who can) call ourselves Muties. A bitter irony. The rest have no words for us, for they have no words. The Silence saw to that. At first it was like listening to a song from another land. People spoke, but the meaning had been stripped away, leaving just the melody. In all the confusion, it took a while to realise it wasn’t like a stroke depriving individuals of language. Hearing words as words was the first thing to go. The second symptom was loss of word formation. Other Muties I have contacted confirmed the same thing: loss of comprehension then composition. And it was not limited to vocal communication. People just stopped being able to write, then read, then for the majority to think.

Confusion spread like a plague, followed by conflict and combat. Maybe the World being so dependent on the Internet and its ubiquitous instant connection between nations was what rendered the lack of the concept of communication so horrific. Overnight entire cultures imploded. Dominant survivors emerged as the new leaders. The power of alpha males (and, in fact, females), seemed to not need the nuances of language. The fist and the foot quickly spread as the new punctuation in our lives.

Eventually, a form of physical gesturing began to emerge; Muties were particularly effective at this, but that was a two edged sword. Ownership of books, or any knowledge storage device, became dangerous to all but the most powerful. Yet the thuggery of the dark years of The Silence eventually passed. Without words to worry the weary fear became a useless tactic. The lack of difference in interpretation levelled the population in a single generation. A new peace descended on the scattered hamlets of the inhabitable continents. The Silence proved mightier than the pen and the sword.

That is when the true deliverers of our salvation made themselves known, coming wordlessly among us, signing a new dawn. Revelation. A becoming of beings worthy to be brothers in a shared future. They thought we would be grateful for this cosmic lesson in humility. Were we ready to begin again, they asked simultaneously across the Globe?

In Lisa’s own words “the 55 Word Challenge is a contest to write a story in 55 words or less.” Each week writers pick one of three images as inspiration. Here’s mine if you would rather not see the original version:

“From Trap to Pot”
by Dr. Mike Reddy (@doctormikereddy) [55 words]

Elana Jane had a lot to answer for. We’d had fun as kids. Kids ended all that. Kids and bills.

Lobsters enter the pots willingly, then can’t escape. So it was with me and Elana Jane. Sure, we still had fun now and again, but I couldn’t help feeling I was in the boiling pan.

The long untended wood rendered every wind into the lightest zephyr. Its thick canopy of foliage filtered every torrential downpour into a sparging of the forest floor. From sunrise the woodsman had single-handedly cleared a section of fern, bramble and hated honeysuckle. Then discarding all but shorts, he felled with axe, lopped with bill hook and laid the stripped trunks of ash and hazel. Not all, mind you, but the rotted, the crooked and the too numerous, leaving the straightest, aloof, insular, unfettered by competition. They would fetch the best price at market, but the profits of his labour would be his son’s reward.

The Sun could now penetrate a little into the wood. So, at 9 o’clock he plonked himself down against an oak to eat his lunch, then basked, naked and somnolent, in its burrowing warmth. Piece-work, the woodsman ruminated to himself, was Peace work also.

The idea is great
Although it was the first Ticckle Tuesday, with only a handful of entries, so far, I’ve had good feedback; especially on the fact that hearing a story in the author’s own voice is something special. The rigour of having to record only 30 seconds – inspired by Ticckle’s own technical restrictions – is also a critical part of this Flash Fiction Compo that makes it unique and worth continuing. Well, I think so anyway, but there will need to be a few changes for the next one…

Tech issues are a problem
Ticckle itself is in “beta”, so can be forgiven a few quirks. However, the biggest problem encountered was audio playback failing for some of my Ticckle videos; the ones giving examples and instructions. These played fine on my phone (in App and Safari/Chrome browser) and fine on an iMac, but when accessed via FaceBook link on PCs participants reported low/no sound. 🙁

Ticckle’s web site having no Search function doesn’t help, with the only filtering being an imposed popularity/recency floating of Ticckles to the top; only saved by how few there are currently. A shame, as it reduces ‘discovery’ of story entries. The only way round this I can see is to ‘suggest’ compo submitters ‘ticckle’ (that is their term for Like/thumbs up/voting for videos) the main theme announcement in App or on the web site, as well as promoting the direct link by FB/Twitter/blog.

Lack of audio presents accessibility issues as well. There is no means of subtitling ticckles 🙁 and I’ve noticed that FB style comments, while allowed, don’t seem to be getting counted properly. I left some explanatory text below a Ticckle video, leading to this blog and the FB group, but the no. of comments reported didn’t change from zero. Only clicking to comment revealed they were there at all.

Finally, Ticckle’s progress bar, which counts down the 30s, seems a bit laggy. As a matter of habit, I allow half a second after beig told “Go!” In recordings to make sure it has really started; more than this gets

uncomfortable for the listener. At two seconds most people will be assuming there’s something wrong, from my experience working in Radio, even with our most recent experience of “buffering” on the Internet. However, the bigger problem is the cut off at the end, which always seems harsh, and a little early (?) to me. So, I’m consciously finishing 1-2 seconds early now, to make sure Ticckle gets a clean fini…
🙂
Seriously, with a small curtesy delay in starting, and a necessary early finish, we really only have 28s to record our stories. So, I’d say don’t include the title in your recording!

Some authors need to submit text
Mostly, this is technically driven – audio drop outs, participants not being Ticckle-literate, etc – but accessibility us a problem generally. So, possibly stupidly, I’m offering to record submissions for those who cannot submit via Ticckle themselves. This could get out of hand, so I’ll need to keep reviewing the workload, but has several advantages:
1) it keeps 30s flash fiction open to as many writers as possible
2) it enables participation by those who don’t like (to hear) their own voice
3) it levels the playing field for Ticckle user votes, which were always intended to be part of the review process
4) it gives me a vocal challenge to interpret the texts
5) it renders the competition immune/separate from Ticckle itself, in case the service dies.

So, the competition lives on. Lessons have been learned. There’s still time to enter – here (leave a comment on the theme announcement post), the FB group, or directly via Ticckle

Alissa Leonard has created the Finish That Thought” Flash Fiction compo, which usually provides an opening line and some ‘special challenge’ words to include, and must be less than 500 words. This week’s compo opening line was “Hands trembling, [he] opened the door.” and the special challenge words were: hoard[s], mountain[s], scale[s].

Here is my story, if you don’t want to see it posted in its original place:

“Here be dragon” by Dr. Mike Reddy (@doctormikereddy)
266 words, special challenge accepted in one sentence!

Hands trembling, he opened the door. “I’m home… Dear.”

“Well, it took you long enough,” his wife snorted. “Gallivanting off while I have to clear up the mess left by that wyvern. You DID kill it? Tell me you got THAT right, at least!”